Danny Klein column: Nathan Peterman not the only QB to struggle against St. Augustine

DANNY KLEIN

Saturday

Oct 22, 2011 at 12:17 AM

It has always seemed fitting to me that the first time I saw Bartram Trail quarterback Nathan Peterman play he was on a substitute field in the pouring rain. That's how his career has felt. Like a great player constantly battling through the elements.

On Friday night against St. Augustine, there were simply too many to count. Peterman was put in situations throughout the night that left him with very little room to succeed.

There's no denying that Peterman was rattled at times. He came into the game with 22 touchdowns and no interceptions and left with 23 scores and two picks.

Clearly, that wasn't ideal.

I saw some isolated incidents of people jeering the Tennessee commit. I'm sure he will have to deal with critics telling him he's overrated and overhyped. But the reality is that great players are defined by their biggest games, and while that should be considered flattering for Peterman, it should also worry him.

He is now 0-5 against the Yellow Jackets, as most people will point to. And the truth is, he really hasn't played well in any of those games. He played OK for a half last year in the playoffs, but completed just one pass after that.

The problem for Peterman, however, is that it really shouldn't define him. He's going through the same pains as guys you might have heard of, say Kyle Parker and Tim Tebow, and is being put on that chopping block. That's some pretty good company.

Peterman will likely have one more chance of course, but I think we should step back and view him from a different angle.

He remains, regardless of his record against St. Augustine, one of the best quarterbacks to play in this county. That's how he should be appreciated.

There were a collection of drops, and the Bears seemed to always be fighting an uphill battle. Both of his interceptions, especially his second one late in the game, came in desperate situations. "Anytime you put a lot into something and it doesn't come out right, it hurts. It hurts right now," he said. "I'm sure those comments are going to come and that's fine. The greatest thing about this team is that we're not going to listen to anything. We're self motivated, a band of brothers."

The whole team, on the other hand, is going to have to get things together.

In the past two years, this loss has been met with a simple mantra: We'll get them next time.

But at what point do you start to think it's something much deeper than that? I've always been a believer in the mental part of sports. Take a look at Tiger Woods for example.

For me, you have to embrace the mental battle before you can every truly achieve your goals.

The Bears are 0-13 against St. Augustine. That's not just a statistic anymore; it's a way of life. You can't escape history. Bartram has not only lost 13 straight, but they've done so in more ways than you would like to count.

Blowouts, near upsets, thrillers, heartbreak. How would you classify this one? I would say disappointment.

There is no hiding from the fact that Bartram had all the pieces on paper to win this game. Forget the playmakers. St. Augustine lost Tarek Odom, Markis Merrill, Kyle West and a host of other stalwarts.

I wrote earlier this season that Bartram felt like a team of destiny. What I meant was, that everything in the universe appeared to be lining up. The schedule was a collection of cupcakes, and most importantly, St. Augustine was in the process of transitioning.

It's foolish to ever say the Yellow Jackets are rebuilding, but there's no question they were changing. This all opened the gates for Bartram to finally break that streak.

It didn't come close to happening.

"This one loss doesn't define our season," safety Jolen Briggs said. "We will definitely see them again; we're going to work hard these next couple of weeks and hopefully next time we'll be prepared."

It was very unlike Bartram to make some quotes in the preseason that could be conceived as trash talking. Personally, I thought it was a step in the right direction.

Part of the process of being great is embracing it. I didn't take it as arrogance, given how many times they had been humbled in the previous years. It felt like Bartram was simply confident, and I can't see how that's a bad thing.

As my father always tells me, you can't make a 5-foot putt if you think you're going to miss it. I took their words as belief they would make it.

That was the key. What St. Augustine did with this hype was amazing. They took everything, bottled it inside and erupted when it mattered most.

They didn't shy away from saying that they felt slighted. And that was the proper response.

"Yes, it really did (bother the team)," running Levent Sands said. "It just made us work harder, though."

Now, it's time for Bartram to do the same. The Bears need to take all this pain, the negative words and blast through their critics. They can't act like it's just another game, because it isn't. This one was about pride. The next one will mean they move on, or simply, they don't.

"I'm glad this happened now rather than later, because at least we can move on," senior Jared Crump said. "In the playoffs, one game and it's over. … We just let it bounce off of us, we don't soak that in at all. We bounce back, and we see what we have to work on and work harder."

That will be Bartram's chance. Hopefully, for its sake, the Bears let people write them off before reminding everybody what a mistake that really was.

Wait, didn't St. Augustine just do that?

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